Exceedingly Rare 1872 Greeley/Brown Campaign Vest

Now here is a most interesting vestige of Horace Greeley's lone presidential bid. Housed in a 19-1/4" x 29-1/4" shadowbox, the hand-made campaign vest carries jet-black stenciled lettering of "GREELEY" and "BROWN." There is moderate soiling on the garment's white portions, which appear to be made of heavy muslin, and also the occasional small tear in the red fabric fringe. Two large, bulbous tassels decorate the corners. The vest measures 12" across the shoulders and 22" from top to bottom (with tassels). Interestingly, the publishing magnate Greeley and his running mate Benjamin Brown didn't receive any electoral votes, even though they garnered 2,800,000 popular votes—only 700,000 less than the Ulysses Grant/Henry Wilson ticket. It wasn't for lack of support; it was because Greeley was already dead by the time the electoral college convened. On the heels of his election defeat, Greeley's wife passed away and he lost control of the Tribune. Those three events drove him to madness. It was a tragic end to the life of a publishing magnate and reformer who had championed such causes as temperance, transcendentalism, communitarianism, and labor unions. Greeley remains quite popular among political collectors, and this unique vest, from the last year of his life, represents an ideal counterpart to the Greeley campaign top hat that we offered in our April 2005 auction.